Can anyone give some guidance on how to establish the correct throat angle for installation of floats on an experimental PA12? How do you know if it is not correct and when to change it?

thanks for your help.

Jim

irishfield

06-01-2005, 07:34 PM

Will depend some on what floats as well...but I'd say a ball park for your set up would be between 3 and 4.5 degrees throat (float top to underside of wing) Ie with float tops level the bottom of your wing should be between 3 and 4.5 degrees nose up.

If you know your thrust line location I'd shoot for 2.7 degrees nose up on it compared to a zero float top.

Make your rear strut pickup adjustable. Put a block insert into the strut with multi holes every 3/8 of an inch. This will let you change the throat at about 0.4 degrees per hole until you get it the way you want. X-wire adjustment moves very little when you change holes so shouldn't be an issue to re-tighten them when you try a new angle.

Let us know how you make out and what angle worked the best. You've got to find the right compromise between a quick take off and a nice landing angle.